Outdoor barbecue grills have become increasingly popular for the summer time cooking of meats and vegetables. Traditionally, barbecue grills have been heated by charcoal briquettes, but a new generation of barbecue grills are heated by gas fired burners.
Many modern barbecue grills have a closeable hood or other structure which can be used to provide an enclosed heating compartment. Such heating compartment can be used like the oven on a stove to slow roast various items of food, such as large pieces of meat.
A problem with present day barbecue grills is that the heat within the cooking compartment is non-uniform. The heat in the central portion of the cooking department tends to be much more intense than the heat in the side portions of the cooking compartment. This leads to uneven cooking within the cooking compartment and makes the use of the outdoor grill somewhat haphazard.
Accordingly, there is a need for a barbecue grill which overcomes this problem in the prior art.
The invention satisfies this need. The invention is a barbecue grill comprising (a) a cooking compartment having a central portion and a pair of opposed side portions, (b) a plenum disposed proximate to the cooking compartment, the plenum comprising a central vent for providing access between the plenum and the central portion of the cooking compartment and a pair of opposed side vents for providing access between the plenum and each of the two opposed side portions of the cooking compartment, and (c) a fan for drawing hot gases from the central portion of the cooking compartment into the plenum via the central vent and for redistributing those gases via the plenum and the pair of opposed side vents to the pair of opposed side portions of the cooking compartment, so that hot gases in the central portion of the cooking compartment can be continuously recirculated to the side portions of the cooking compartment.